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ECCLESIASTICAL 

ESTABLISHMENTS. 



THE ARTICLE 



» ECCLESIASTICAL 

ESTABLISHMENT S," 

TAKEN FROM 

THE WESTMINSTER REVIEW, 

NUMBER X. 
FOR APRIL, 



[For Distribution, and not for Sale.] 



ILonirmt : 

PRINTED FOR A TRACT SOCIETY, BY G. HEWETT, BOUVERIE 
STREET, FLEET STREET. 

1826. 



■ 1 ' 



205449 



ECCLESIASTICAL ESTABLISHMENTS, 



We intend, on the present occasion, as far as our limits will 
permit, to examine to the bottom the question of an Ecclesiasti- 
cal Establishment, and more especially of the Church of England, 
in its effect on religion, on morality, on the character and actions 
of the clergy, on learning, on education, and on government. 

We think it proper to begin by distinctly staling our opinion, 
that an ecclesiastical establishment is essentially antichristian ; 
that religion can never be safe or sound, unless where it is left 
free to every man's choice, wholly uninfluenced by the operation 
either of punishment or reward on the part of the magistrate. 
We think it proper to go even further, and declare, that it is not 
religion only to which an ecclesiastical establishment is hostile : 
in our opinion, there is not one of the great interests of humanity, 
on which it does not exercise a baneful influence. 

We know well to what we expose ourselves, by the promul- 
gation of these great truths, for such they appear to us, and such 
we trust we shall establish them to be, by evidence which cannot 
be resisted. The clergy have, by a long course of usurpation, 
established a sort of right to call themselves and their interests, 
by the most sacred names. In ecclesiastical language, the wealth 
and power of the clergy are religion. Be as treacherous, be as 
dishonest, be as unfeeling and cruel, be as profligate, as you 
please, you may still be religious. But breathe on the interests 
of the clergy, make them surmise discredit at your hands, and 
you are the enemy of religion directly ; nay, the enemy of your 
God; and all the mischief which religious prejudice and anti- 
pathy, the poisoned, deadly weapon of the clergy, can bring down 
upon its victims, is the sure and necessary consequence of your 
sacrilegious audacity. 

For protection against this spirit of persecution, strong and 
formidable to the present hour, we look to public opinion, daily 
approaching to the condition of a match for this once gigantic 
foe ; and the strong line which we trust we shall be able to draw 
between the interests of a corporation of priests, and those inte^ 



4 



rests of religion about which alone good men can feel any con- 
cern. 

We desire also to be understood as disapproving an injus- 
tice of which clergymen have often great reason to complain, 
that of confounding the character of/ individuals with the corpo- 
ration to which they belong. We have very many bad corpora- 
tions, in which excellent men are included, and such is the case 
of the priestly corporation. But the question is not how many 
clergymen, from the influence of education, and the spirit of the 
community to which they belong, are, in their private relation, 
and taken individually, estimable men. You may take a number 
of men, one by one, all virtuous and honourable, who yet, if you 
club them together, and enable them to act in a body, will appear 
to have renounced every principle of virtue, and in pursuit of their 
own objects will trample, without shame or remorse, upon every 
thing valuable to their fellow men. 

We proceed upon the principle that men desire power, that 
they desire it in as great quantity as possible, and that they do 
not desire it for nothing. Men do not strive for power, that it 
may lie in their hands without using. And what is the use of it? 
The answer is plain. It is to make other men do what we please: 
to place their persons, their actions, and properties, to as great 
an extent as possible, at our disposal. This is known to be one 
of the strongest propensities in human nature, and altogether 
insatiable. 

The ministers of religion are not less subject to this passion 
than other men. They are cited, proverbially, as an example of 
it in excess. 

When acting singly, each confined to his own congregation, 
to the small circle of individuals to whom personally his ministry 
can extend, the quantity of power a minister of religion can de- 
rive from his influence over the minds which he directs, is too 
small to prompt him to hazard much for its acquisition. No in- 
ordinate thirst for power is excited, and any perversity either of 
doctrine or of conduct, attempted for that end, is observed too 
closely to escape detection. It is only on the large scale that 
success can attend those mischievous machinations. Whatever 
motives can operate upon a minister of religion, to be of use to 
his flock, as an example and monitor of good conduct, retain in 
the natural sphere their natural force, unchecked by the appetites 
which the prospect of acquiring an extensive command over 
other men regularly engenders. 

When the whole, or the largest class of the ministers of reli- 
gion, are aided by the magistrate in forming themselves into a 
body, so constituted as to act with united power, they become 
animated by the spirit which predominates in the leading men. 
This is a fact too certain to be disputed, and of which the causes 
are too obvious to require illustration. The spirit which predomi- 



i 



Wales in the leading men is generated by the circumstances in 
which they are placed, the power immediately conferred upon 
them, and the prospect of increasing it without limits, by the 
means which they have at their disposal. That they will be actu- 
ated by the desire to make use of those means to the utmost, is a 
proposition which the history of human nature enables us to as- 
sume as undeniable. The man who would question it, is un- 
worthy of an answer. - 

The great results, which spring from the combination of mo- 
tives and powers, thus generated, is the subject to which the pre- 
sent article will be devoted ; and it is of an importance to justify 
a call for the best attention of our readers, and for a calm and 
unprejudiced consideration of the evidence which we have to 
adduce* 

The peculiarity of the case of an incorporated clergy arises 
from the peculiarity of the means they have to employ. In the 
ordinary case of power, the influence over men's minds is the 
effect of the power. The power exists first, and the influene fol- 
lows. In the case of clerical power, this order is inverted ; the 
influence comes first, and the power afterwards. The power is 
the result of the influence. The influence, therefore, is to be ac- 
quired in the first instance, and the greater the degree in which it 
is acquired, the greater the power which is the darling object of 
pursuit. 

The first result which we shall mention, of this pursuit by 
the clergy, of influence over the minds of their countrymen, is the 
desire of the monopoly of that influence. They are naturally ac- 
tuated by their thirst for influence to prevent all competition with 
themselves in obtaining it. Just in so far as they expect great 
consequences from possessing it perfect and undivided, so great 
must be their fears of having it shared, or lost, by the success of 
rivals. Rivals not only threaten them with the partial, or total 
deprivation of that which they desire to occupy entire; but they 
bring the immediate, not the problematical, evil, of a great disturb- 
ance of ease. Without rivals, a clergy can with little trouble pos- 
sess themselves of the minds of their countrymen. They can riot 
in power and ease at the same time. To maintain their influence 
in competition with others, trouble must be taken at any rate. 
Diligence must be used, and that incessant. Vigilance must 
never go to sleep. Industry must never relax. But a life of la- 
bour and care is a very different thing from a life of security, indo- 
lence, and repose. 

Nor is this all : sacrifices of another sort are required, by 
the competition with rivals. Abstinence, self-denial, and mortifi- 
cation are found to be powerful means of establishing a spiritual 
influence on the minds of men. Rivals, in order to be success 
ful, have recourse to those means ; and the corporate clergy, in. 
order not to be supplanted, are obliged to maintain themselves by 



6 



the same painful expedients. Instead of pleasure enjoyed in all 
its' shapes, and credit derived from the display of it, they must 
practise all the appearances, and, for the sake of the appearance, 
much of the reality, of its renunciation. 

It thus appears, that almost every thing which is alluring 1 to 
the mind of man, in actual power and pleasure, every thing which 
is dreadful to it in weakness, privation, and pain, urge and impel 
a corporate clergy to labour for the extinction of rivals. 

How steadily they have obeyed this impulse, their history 
declares. Of their expedients for the accomplishment of their 
object, the first and most conspicuous is, their application to the 
magistrate for the powers of persecution. 

It is not required, for the present purpose, that we should ex- 
hibit the persuasions they applied to the magistrate,* to bring him 
to believe that it was for his interest to lend to them his power 
for the extermination of their rivals. That would be an instruc- 
tive, but a voluminous exposure. What we can here attempt is, 
only to exhibit evidence, first, of their eager endeavours for this 
unrighteous end, and secondly, of the consequences which flowed 
from them. 

It is not probable that we shall be very importunately called 
upon for evidence of the persecuting endeavours of the Catholic 
church, through its various ages, from the time when the first 
Christian emperor declared himself in favour of a particular class 
of priests, down to the consummation of their power, first, iu the 
extirpation of all competitors for the spiritual dominion in Chris- 
tendom, and secondly, in the hold which, through that spiritual 
dominion, they obtained over every other power, wielding at 
pleasure the arms and the wealth of almost every Christian com- 
munity. What we shall adduce will be such hints merely as are 
calculated to awaken the recollection of our readers. 

No time was lost. The first sovereign who protected the 
Christians was scarcely seated on his throne, when a fiery contest 
arose between the clergy of the Arian and the Athanasian creeds, 
for the possession of his ear. The Council of Nice, a memorable 
event, was summoned to determine the point, in other words, to 
satisfy the sovereign fully, which party, by its numbers and 
powers, it was most for his interest to join. The question was 
doubtful, and the balance for some time wavered. When the de- 
cision at last was made, and the Athanasian clergy became a dis- 
tinguished body, with the power of government engaged for their 

* A specimen of them appears in the tythe case of Charlemagne: — "His 
esteem for the piety and knowledge of the clergy tempted him to intrust that as- 
piring order with temporal dominion and civil jurisdiction ; and his son Lewis, 
when he was stripped and degraded by the bishops, might accuse, in some mea- 
sure, the imprudence of his father. ^ His laws enforced the imposition of tythes, 
because the demons had proclaimed in the air that the default of payment had been 
t ie cause of the last scarcity.'' — Gibbon, chap. xlix. 



7 



support, what were the consequences ? Even the cold narrative 
of Mosheim conveys a pungent sense of the zeal with which they 
proceeded to deliver themselves from all competition, in obtaining 
influence over the human mind; their rage to establish a mono- 
poly of spiritual dominion; to accomplish the extermination of 
rivals. Persecution flamed ; blood was spilt ; the non-conform- 
ing clergy, that is, non-conforming to the will of the leading di- 
vines, who now shared in the powers of government, were for- 
bidden to teach : as often as they hazarded disobedience, they 
were thrown into prison, and subjected to other cruelties, not 
stopping short even of death. 

And above all things, great paius were taken to destroy their 
books. 

This was a capital point. Books were the most dangerous, 
and of course the most hated enemies, of a monopolizing clergy. 
No truths, not for their advantage ; no exposure of lies which 
were ; therefore no books but their own. 

Their strong and persevering purpose proved fatally effectual 
to its end. Of all the sects of Christians which appeared in the 
early centuries, the books, which are known to have been exceed- 
ingly numerous, were so completely extirpated, that a vestige of 
them scarcely remains ; and it is with difficul fy that a few scat- 
tered evidences can be collected of what those earl y and perse- 
cuted sects of Christians either believed or practised. 

Not only was all evidence of what they really were almost 
wholly obliterated, but their memory has been handed down to 
execration, by general accusations of the most disgusting vices, 
and the most atrocious crimes. Nor was it till the era of the 
Reformation, that some enlightened Protestants, beginning to ask 
what evidence was afforded of these imputed atrocities, disgrace- 
ful not only to professing Christians, but to human nature itself 
discovered, to their infinite surprise, that there was no such, 
thing : that of the little we really know of the ancient heretics, 
almost every thing goes to the disproof of the horrid accusations 
transmitted by the orthodox clergy, and tends to show, that both 
morality and learning were at a higher pitch among the heretics 
than among their exterminating enemies. 

Of the tendency, of the frame and bent, of the clerical mind, 
the word heretic involves evidence which reaches not the head 
only, but the heart. The early church used the Grecian lan- 
guage, and the word heresy is Greek. Exactly, correctly, lite- 
rally, it signifies choice. The crime of heresy, was the crime of 
making a choice ! 

There was the consummation of the clerical dominion ! 
When it became execrable to make, and he became execrated who 
did make, a choice, that is, when the clergy might choose what- 
ever other people were to choose, their power was thenceforward 
limited only by their will. 



g 



How their will operated, those of our readers who ate tll& 
least acquainted with history, cannot stand in need of our in- 
formation. 

Not only did they give and take away crowns y they boldly 
assumed that no crown could be righteously held, except at their 
discretion. 

They subjected all Christendom to an enormous and destruc- 
tive taxation for their own benefit ; having succeeded in the au- 
dacious attempt to persuade the magistrate, that because the 
Jewish tribe qf . Levi, which had no share in the holy land, had a 
tenth of iis produce, the Christian clergy should have a tenth of 
the produce of the land of Christendom ; that is, as every man 
must eat his com a tenth dearer, one-tenth part, for their use, of; 
every man's labour in Christendom. 

Nor was this extravagant exaction the only source to them 
of inordinate wealth. They levied taxes to a great amount in 
other forms, and persuaded magistrates and others to bestow 
upon them gifts, till a great proportion of the land in every coun- 
try in Christendom, in some a half, in few less than ; a third, was, 
in ecclesiastical hands. 

The most profound and successful of all the advocates of 
Christianity against the modern objectors, the venerable and vir- 
tuous Campbell, introducing his account of what he calls *' the 
third grand expedient of the church, for securing the implicit obe- 
dience of her votaries, persecution," dates its commencement from 
the day and hour when *.? Constantine embraced the faith, and' 
gave the church a sort of political establishment in the empire ; >r 
and he adds the following important reflections : — 

" From the apologies of the Fathers before that period, (so 
the defences of our religion written by them are named) it is evi- 
dent, that they universally considered persecution for any opi- 
nions, whether true or false, as the heighth of injustice and op- 
pression. Nothing can be juster than the sentiment of Tertullian, 
which was, indeed, as far as appears, the sentiment of all the 
Fathers of the first three centuries. ' Non religionis est cogere 
religionem, quee sponte suscipi debeat, non vi/ And to the same 
purpose Lactantius, ' Quis imponatmihi necessitatem vel colendi 
quod nolim, vel quod velim non colendi? Quid jam nobis ulte 
rius relinquitur, si etiam hoc, quod voluntate fieri oportet, libido 
extorqueat aliena V Again, 1 Non est opus vi et injuria ; quia 
religio cogi non potest, verbis potius quam verberibus res agenda 
est, ut sit voluntas/ Once more, * Longe diversa sunt carnifi- 
cina et pietas, nec potest aut Veritas cum vi, aut justitia cum cru- 
delitate, conjungi/ Their notions in those days, in regard to 
civil government, seem also to have been much more correct than 
they became soon after. For all Christians, in the ages of the 
martyrs, appear to have agreed in this, that the magistrate's only 



9 



object ought to be the peace and temporal prosperity of the eorrH 
monwealth. 

" But (such alas ! is the depravity of human nature) when 
the church was put on a different footing, men began, not all at 
once, but gradually, to change their system in regard to those ar- 
ticles, and seemed strongly inclined to think, that there was no 
injustice in retaliating upon their enemies, by employing those 
unhallowed weapons in defence of the true religion, which had 
been so cruelly employed in support of a false : not considering^ 
that by this dangerous position, that one may justly persecute in 
support of the truth, the right of persecuting for any opinions will 
be effectually secured to him who holds them, provided he have 
the power. For what is every man's immediate standard of or- 
thodoxy but his own opinions? And if he have a right to perse- 
cute in support of them, because of the ineffable importance of 
sound opinions to our eternal happiness, it must be even his duty 
to do it when he can. For if that interest, the interest of the soul 
and eternity, come at all within the magistrate's province, it is un- 
questionably the most important part of it. Now, as it is impos- 
sible he can have any other immediate directory, in regard to what 
is orthodox, but his own opinions, and as the opinions of different 
men are totally different, it will be incumbent, by the strongest of 
all obligations, on one magistrate to persecute in support of a 
faith, which it is equally incumbent on another by persecution to 
destroy. Should ye object, that the standard is not any thing so 
fleeting as opinion : it is the word of God, and right reason. 
This, if ye attend to it, will bring you back to the very same point 
which ye seek to avoid. The dictates both of Scripture and of 
reason, we see but too plainly, are differenlly interpreted by dif- 
ferent persons, of whose sincerity we have no ground to doubt. 
Now to every individual, that only amongst all the varieties of 
sentiments can be his rule, which to the best of his judgment, 
that is, in his opinion, is the import of either. Nor is there a pos- 
sibility of avoiding this recurrence at last. But such is the intoxi- 
cation of power, that men, blinded by it, will not allow themselves 
tp look forward to those dreadful consequences. And such is the 
presumption of vain man (of which bad quality the weakest judg- 
ments have commonly the greatest share) that it is with difficulty 
any one person can be brought to think, that any other person 
has, or can have, as strong conviction of a different set of opi- 
nions, as he has of his."* — Vol. ii. pp. 287—289. 

This excellent writer then goes on to trace the progress of 
the evil. 

" I proceed to show the advances which, from time to time, 
were made, till that system of persecution, which, in a great part 

* Lectures on Ecclesiastical History, by George Campbell, D. D. Principal of 
Marischal College, Aberdeen. 



10 



of the world, still obtains, was brought to maturity and esta- 
blished. For ages after the opinion first took plaee among 
Christians, that it was the magistrate's duty to restrain heretics 
by the infliction of civil penalties, they retained so much modera- 
tion, as not to think that the punishment could justly extend to 
death, or mntilation, o*r even to the effusion of blood. But now 
that the empire was become Christian, there gradually arose in it 
diverse laws against this new crime heresy, which are still extant 
in the codes of Theodosian and Justinian, imposing on the de- 
linquents fines, banishments, or confiscations, according to the 
circumstances, and supposed degree, of the delinquency All 
that regarded the execution of those laws, the trial as well as the 
sentence, devolved on the magistrate. Only the nature of the 
crime, what was heresy or schism, was determined by the eccle- 
siastical judge. One step in an evil course naturally leads to 
another. The first step was made when civil penalties were de- 
nounced against particular opinions and modes of thinking. 
This may be considered as the first stage of the doctrine and 
practice of intolerance in the Christian church. Nor could any 
thing be more explicitly, or more universally, condemned than 
this has been, by the Fathers of the first three centuries, and se- 
veral of the fourth. Humani juris et naturalis potestatis est, said 
Tertullian, in the beginning of the third century, unicuique quod 
putaverit colere ; and Hilary of Poitiers, in the fourth, in opposi- 
tion to those who favoured the interposition of the magistrate. 
Deus cognitionem sui docuit, potius quam exegit, et operationum 
ccelestium admiratione, prceceptis suis concilians auctoritatem, co- 
actam confitendi se aspernatus est voluntatem. Again, Deus uni- 
versitalis est, obsequio non eget necessario, non requirit coactam 
confessionem : non fallendus est sed promerendus, simplicitate quce- 
rendus est, confessione discendus est, charitate amandus est, timore 
venerandus est, voluntatis probitate retinendus est. At vero quid 
Istvd, quod sacerdotes timere Deum vinculis coguntur, poenis ju- 
bentur ? Sacerdotes carceribus continentur ? Men's system of 
conduct may come, we see, to be totally reversed. But this is 
always the work of time. Every advance has its difficulty, and is 
made with hesitation. But one difficulty surmounted emboldens 
a man, and renders it easier for him to surmount another. That 
again makes way for the next, and so on till the change be total." 
—Vol. ii. pp. 293-295. 

While the stupidity of the middle ages was still in its per- 
fection, the fetters of the clergy upon the human mind were easily 
preserved from relaxation. 

" For some centuries," says Dr. Campbell, " particularly the 
eighth, ninth, and tenth, remarkable for nothing so much, as the 
vilest superstition and grossest ignorance, and for insurrections, 
revolutions, and confusion, heretics and sectaries made but little 
noise, and were as little minded. With the revival of know 
ledge, even in its dawn, these also revived." — p. 299. 



11 



u All attacks upon received doctrines must ultimately affect 
the power by which they are established. But when the assault 
is made directly on that power, the fabric of church authority is 
in the most imminent danger. The aim of the former is only to 
make a breaeh in the wall of the edifice, but that of the latter is 
an attempt to sap the foundation. As we have seen all along 
that the darling object of Rome is power, to which every other 
consideration is made to yield, we may believe that attempts of 
this kind would excite a more than ordinary resentment. This, 
in fact, was the consequence : an unusual degree of rancour in 
the ecclesiastics, more especially in the pontiff and his minions, 
mingled itself with their bigotry or mistaken zeal (for it would 
be unjust to impute the effect to either cause separately), and 
produced the many bloody, and, till then, unexampled scenes of 
cruelty, which ensued. The popes, by letter, frequently excited 
the bishops as well as princes, the bishops instigated the magi- 
strates, by all possible means, to subdue or exterminate the ene- 
mies of the church. When the number of these enemies was so 
great, that it was impossible to attain this end by means of judi- 
catories, civil or ecclesiastical, princes were enjoined, on pain of 
excommunication, interdict, deprivation, &c, to make war upon 
them, and extirpate them by fire and sword. And in order to 
allure, by rewards, as well as terrify by punishment, the same 
indulgences and privileges were bestowed on them who engaged 
in those holy battles, and with equal reason, as had been be- 
stowed on the crusaders, who fought for the recovery of the 
holy sepulchre against the Saracens in the east." — Vol. ii. pp. 
301. 202. 

As the improvement of mind advanced, the need of efforts 
more aud more strong, to crush the freedom of thought, produced 
at last the greatest monster which the world ever beheld ; Holy 
Inquisition; the natural progeny, the legitimate offspring, reared 
to maturity, of priestly power engendering with magisterial igno- 
rance; a conjugal connection, usually denominated the alliance 
of church and state, which always produces children with a 
true family likeness, but has never produced another of such 
gigantic powers as the Holy Tribunal, of which Dr. Campbell 
says, 

" It may not be improper to conclude our account of the 
origin of the Inquisition, with a few things in illustration of the 
spirit in which it proceeds, that every one may have it in his 
power to judge, whether the relation it bears to the spirit of 
Christ be denominated more properly resemblance, or contrariety. 
It is so far from following the rules of almost all other tribunals, 
where any regard is shown to equity, or the rights of human na- 
ture, that, in every respect, where the ecclesiastic power has not 
baen checked by the secular, those rules have been reversed. 
The account is entirely just, as far as it goes, which is given by 



11 

Voltaire of the Spanish Inquisition, and he might have added; 'of 
the Portuguese, for both are on the same model. ' Their form 
of proceeding is an infallible way to destroy whomsoever the in- 
quisitors please.' And let it be observed, that they have strong 
motives for destroying a rich culprit; as their sentence of con- 
demnation is followed by the confiscation of all his estate, real 
and personal, of which two-thirds go to the church, and one- 
third to the state ; so that it may be said, with the strictest pro* 
priety, that the judges themselves are parties, having a personal 
interest in the issue against the prisoner. * The prisoners are 
not confronted with the accuser or informer.' Nay, they are 
not so much as told who it is that informs. His name is kept 
Secret to encourage the trade of informing. And, surely, a bet- 
ter expedient could not have been devised for promoting this 
dark business, than by thus securing at once concealment and 
gratification, with impunity, to private malice, envy, and revenge. 
Further, ' there is no informer, or witness, who is not listened 
to. A public convict, a notorious malefactor, an infamous person, 
a common prostitute, a child, are, in the holy office, though no 
where else, creditable accusers and witnesses. Even the son 
may depose against his father, the wi*e against her husband.' 
The detection of the grossest prevarification in the delator and 
witnesses is hardly ever punished, unless with a very gentle re- 
buke : let it be observed, by the way, that to the profligate and 
abandoned they can be very gentle, for they dread above all 
things, to do aught that might discourage informers, spies, and 
witnesses. And that there may be no risk of a want of informa- 
tion, they have, in all parts of the kingdom, spies of all different 
qualities, who are denominated the familiars of the holy office, a 
place of which even men of high rank are sometimes ambitious, 
from different motives, some for the greater personal security, 
others because it empowers them to take a severe revenge on 
their enemies, and others, no doubt, because they think they do 
God good service. The wretched prisoner is no more made ac- 
quainted with his crime than with his accuser. His being told the 
one might possibly lead him to guess the other. To avoid this, 
he is compelled, by tedious confinement, in a noisome. dungeon, 
wh e re he never sees a face but the jailor's, and is not permitted 
the use either of books, or of pen and ink, or, when confine- 
ment does not succeed, he is compelled, by a train of the most 
excruciating tortures, * to inform against himself; to divine and 
to confess the crime laid to his charge, of which often he is ig- 
norant.' An effectual method to bring nine-tenths of mankind 
to confess any thing, true or false, which may gratify their tor- 
mentors, and put an end to their misery. ' This procedure,' 
adds our historian, * unheard of till the institution of this court, 
makes the whole kingdom tremble. Suspicion reigns in every 
breast. Friendship and openness are at an end. The brother 



13 



dreads his brother, the father his son. Hence taciturnity is 
become the characteristic of a nation endued with all the vivacity 
natural to the inhabitants of a warm and fruitful climate. To 
this tribunal we must likewise impute that profound ignorance of 
sound philosophy, in which Spain lies buried, whilst Germany, 
England, France, aud even Italy, have discovered so many truths, 
and enlarged the sphere of our knowledge. Never is human 
nature so debased, as where ignorance is armed with power.' 

" In regard to the extent of power given to inquisitors by papal 
bulls,, and generally admitted by the secular authority in those 
countries where the inquisition is established, I shall give the 
few following instances out of many that might be produced. 
First, it is ordered, that the convicts be burnt alive, aud in 
public ; and that all they have be confiscated i all princes and 
rulers who refuse their concurrence in executiag these and the 
other sentences authorized by the church, shall be brought under 
censure, that is, anathematized and excommunioated, their 
states or kingdoms laid under an interdict, &c. The house, 
also, in which the heretic is apprehended, must be razed to the 
ground, even though it be not his, but the property of a person, 
totally unsuspected. This ferocious kind of barbarity, so utterly 
irreconcilable to all the principles of equity, is, nevertheless, ex- 
tremely politic, as it is a powerful means of raising horror in the 
ignorant populace, and of increasing the awe of this tribunal, in 
men of all denominations, who must consider it as extremely 
dangerous to have the smallest connection with any person sus- 
pected of heresy, or so much as to admit him into their houses. 
The Inquisitors are also empowered to demand of any person, 
whom they suspect (and, for their suspicions, they are not obliged 
to give reason), that he solemnly adjure heretical opinions, and 
even give pecuniary security that he shall continue a good Catho- 
lic. The court of Inquisition are also privileged to have their own 
guards, and are authorized to give licences to others to carry 
arms, and to enlist crusaders. One of Paul the 4th's bulls does 
not allow a reprieve from the sentence to one who, on the first 
conviction, recants his opinion, if the heresy be in any of the 
five articles mentioned in that bull. But what is, if possible,, 
still more intolerable, is, that, by a bull of Pius the 5th, no sen- 
tence in favour of the accused shall be held a final acquittal, 
though pronounced after canonical purgation; but the holy of- 
fice shall have it in their power, though no new evidence or pre- 
sumption has appeared, to re-commence the trial, on the very 
same grounds they had examined formerly. This ordinance en- 
sures to the wretch, who has been once accused, a course of terror 
and torment for life, from which no discovery of innocence, though 
clear as day, no judgment of the court can release him. Another 
bull of the same pontiff ordains, that whoever shall behave inju- 
riously, or so much as threaten a notary, or other servant of the 



14 



Inquisition, or a witness examined in the court, shall beside ex- 
communication, be held guilty of high treason, be punished ca- 
pitally, his goods confiscated, his children rendered infamous, 
and incapable of succeeding to any body by testament. Every 
one is subjected to the same punishment, who makes an escape out 
of the prison of the office, or who attempts, though unsuccessfully 
to make it ; and whoever favours or intercedes for any such. In 
these classes, persons of the highest rank^ even princes, are com- 
prehended. 

" Every one must be sensible, that there is something in the 
constitution of this tribunal so monstrously unjust, so exorbi- 
tantly cruel, that it is matter of astonishment, that in any coun- 
try the people, as well as the secular powers, would not rather 
have encountered any danger, than have submitted to receive it. 
Nor can there be a stronger evidence of the brutish ignorance, 
as well as gross depravity of any nation, than that such a judi- 
catory has an establishment among them." — Vol. ii. pp. 
312—318. 

These are specimens (for specimens are all which we can 
afford to present) of the evidence with which history teems, o^. 
the persecuting spirit of the first great incorporation of priests. 
The priestly incorporation called the Church of England stands 
next in power ; and, as a natural consequence, next, also, in the 
ranks of persecution. 

It is highly instructive to observe the circumstances, in which 
the English corporation of priests made their efforts to secure 
to themselves the monopoly of priestly influence on the minds 
of their countrymen, by their grand instrument, persecution. 

They had just executed a successful revolt against the mono- 
poly of their predecessors, and to effect this object had been- 
obliged to destroy the foundation on which it principally rested, 
the claim of infallibility. The strong arguments by which the 
Catholics supported this claim, affirming that the credibility of 
revelation itself rested upon it, they had set at nought, denying 
that it was ever promised to his church by the Author of our 
religion, or that any man or set of men had ever given, or 
could give, satisfactory evidence of possessing it. They in- 
ferred, accordingly, that they had a right to impute error to the 
Catholic church, when they saw reason to do so, and to sepa- 
rate from her communion, when they deemed it unsafe to abide 
in it. 

It is astonishing how completely, and immediately, they lost 
sight, or lost regard, of the inevitable conclusion, that, if they 
had a right, on the inference of error, to separate from the 
Church of Rome, others had as good a right, on the same in- 
ference, to separate from them. 

The formula of words, made use of by the two parties, to 
give colour to their proceedings, was different, the proceedings 



15 



themselves were essentially the same. We persecute, said the 
Church of Rome, because we are infallible, and know it is damn- 
able to dissent from us. 

We, said the Church of England, persecute, because that ex- 
cellent order, which is called Uniformity, will be violated by dis- 
senting from us. 

The Catholics were infinitely more generous and consistent 
in their proceedings and arguments. We, said they, addressing 
themselves to the objects of their penal benevolence, know for 
certain that you will plunge yourself and others in eternal and 
inconceivable torments, unless we interpose. 

What was the corresponding address of the English ? We 
know not, they were obliged to say, we know not, at least not 
for certain, but you may be in the right, and we may be in the 
wrong : nevertheless, we think it good to bring you over to our 
opinion, by acting on your body, when we cannot succeed with 
your mind. 

Allow the premises of the Catholic priest, his conclusion was 
indubitable, and persecution, on his part, the highest of all con- 
ceivable duties. Adhere to the premises of the English priest, 
and there is nothing in human conduct more atrocious than his 
proceedings. 

What man is there, who owns human feelings, who if he 
knew for certain that he could save a single fellow creature from 
everlasting torments, would not do so, by extinguishing the mere 
sublunary life, an instant, not of one man only, or a few, but of 
millions, nay of the whole human race ? And how cheap would 
be the purchase ! 

From the doctrine on the other hand of the Englisn priests ; 
that no man is infallible, and hence that when two men equally 
sincere in their intentions, and perfect in their understandings, 
come to opposite conclusions, it is just as likely that one is right 
as the other, aud certain that if one of them comes over to the 
opinion of the other, wrought upon by hopes and fears, pains 
and pleasures, or by any thing but the clear perception of evi- 
dence, he acts dishonestly and wickedly ; it follows, that the 
English priests, in applying their pains and pleasures, hopes and 
fears, incur a double condemnation ; first, in suborning this 
dishonesty ; secondly, in risking the salvation of a fellow creature, 
who may himself have the saving belief, when they seduce him 
into damuing error. 

As the inconsistency and atrocity are glaring of persecuting 
any man for opinions without the gift of infallibility, the church 
of England has virtually assumed that she is infallible disclaim- 
ing the assumption, as far as mere words go, but in ideas really 
and effectually maintaining it. 

This was wittily expressed by a certain author, Sir Richard 
Steele, if we mistake not, who said that the difference between 



16 



the church of England and the church of Rome was this : The 
church of Rome could not be in the wrong ; the church of Eng* 
land never was. The church of England is like the man of whom 
Erasmus jocosely said, that though not the pope, he had a pope 
in his belly. 

It would require many more than our number of pages, to give 
the history, even in abridgment, of the pessecutiona done by the 
priestly incorporation in England. The whole of the five vo- 
lumes of Neal is but an imperfect record of them. We must con- 
tent ourselves with selecting a few things as specimens. 

Hardly was the authority of the church of Rome renounced,, 
,and a new order of things recognised in England, when diver- 
sity of opinion began to be felt, and consequent uneasiness mani- 
fested itself among the leaders of the clergy. The growth of 
opinions odious to those leaders was accelerated by the return of 
the sufferers, Who driven into exile by the persecutions of Mary, 
had resorted to Geneva and the Protestant parts of France* and 
drunk in the doctrines of a Presbyterian or Republican form of 
church government among the zealous and comparatively learned 
and accomplished Reformists of those parts of the continent. 

It was not long before the desultory efforts of the elergy . for 
crushing this spirit were embodied in a grand organ, of which we 
are happy that it is not necessary for us to give the description 
in our own words. But we entreat our readers to bestow upon it 
a sufficient portion of their attention ; and to estimate coolly the 
weight of evidence which it involves. 

Upon the death of Grindal, in 1583, the queen named to 
the primacy, Whitgift, a " zealous churchman," says Hume* 
" who had already signalized his pen in controversy, arid who, 
having in vain attempted to convince the puritans by argument*, 
was now resolved to open their eyes by power, and by the exe- 
cution of penal statutes. He informed the queen that all the 
spiritual authority lodged in the prelates- was insignificant with T 
out the sanction of the crown • and as there was no ecclesiastical 
commission at that time in force, he engaged her to issue a new 
one, more arbitrary than any of the former, and conveying more 
unlimited authority. The jurisdiction of the court extended over 
the whole kingdom, and over all orders of men : and every cir- 
cumstance of its authority, and all its methods of proceeding, 
were contrary to the clearest principles of law and natural equity* 
The commissioners were empowered to visit and reform all errors* 
heresies, schisms, in a word, to regulate all opinions, as well as 
to punish all breach of uniformity in the exercise of public wor- 
ship. They were directed to make inquiry, not only by the legal 
methods of juries and witnesses, but by all other means and 
ways which they could devise; that is, by the rack, by torture, 
by inquisition, by imprisonment. Where they found reason to 
suspect any person, they might administer to him an oath, called 



17 



ex-officio, by which he was bound to answer all questions, and 
might thereby be obliged to accuse himself or his most intimate 
friend. The fines which they levied were discretionary, and often 
occasioned the total ruin of the offender, contrary to the esta- 
blished laws of the kingdom. The imprisonment to which they 
condemned any delinquent was limited by no rule but their own 
pleasure. Tbey assumed a power of imposing on the clergy 
what new articles of subscription, and consequently of faith, 
they thought proper. Though all other spiritual courts were 
subject, since the Reformation, to exhibitions from the supreme 
courts of law, the ecclesiastical commissioners were exempted from 
that legal jurisdiction, and were liable to no control. And the more 
to enlarge their authority, they were empowered to punish all in- 
cests, adulteries, fornications ; all outrages, misbehaviours, and 
disorders in marriage. And the punishments which they might 
inflict were according to their wisdom, conscience, and discretion. 
In a word, this court was a real inquisition ; attended with all 
the iniquities, as well as. cruelties, inseparable from that tri- 
bunal."* 

, This must suffice, and well it may, as evidence of the passion 
for persecution which at that time distinguished the clergy. For 
their proceedings in detail we must refer to the proper authorities : 
to Neal, and the historians of the several sects ; for in the gene- 
ral histories of England a most imperfect view of this interesting 
part of our story is to be obtained. It is well known that, in 
spite of all the persecution which could be applied, the spirit of the 
nation continued to rise, and rise the faster in consequence of 
that persecution, till the appearance of Laud. Of that man we 
have recently had occasion to speak. He is a prolific source 
of evidence, not only of the spirit of the clergy in his own age; 
but, selected as he has been, for the standard of a churchman 
to the present hour, of the spirit of the clergy in every suc- 
ceeding age. 

That he was a relentless persecutor, is saying little. With 
such an impetuous rage of persecution was he driven, that, un- 
deterred by all that opposition which public opinion now ob- 
viously presented to him, he went on, recklessly, to raise the 
storm, in which the church and the monarchy were both levelled 
with the ground. 

At the restoration of the monarchy (of the intermediate pe- 
riod it is not necessary for us to speak), the church was also re- 
stored ; and with it, the spirit of persecution in its pristine 
vigour. To ensure the extinction of rivals, the Act of Uniformity, 
that is, an act for the persecution of all dissenters from the Esta- 
blished Church, was passed in 1662. 

This act," says Hume, " reinstated the church in the same 

* Plume's History of England, chap. xli. 



18 



condition in which it stood at the commencement of the civil 
wars."* What that condition was, in regard to powers and de- 
sires of persecution, the account just recited, of the commission 
court, sufficiently testifies. " And," continues Hume, " as the 
old persecuting laws of Elizabeth still subsisted in their full 
rigour, and new clauses of a like nature were now enacted, ail 
the king's promises of toleration, and of indulgence to tender 
consciences were thereby eluded and broken." The following 
great historical fact is remarkable. " However," adds the his- 
torian, " it is agreed that the king did not voluntarily concur 
with this violent measure, and that the zeal of Clarendon and 
of the church party among the commons, seconded by the in- 
trigues of the Catholics, was the chief cause which extorted 
his consent." Hume says, that the Catholics seconded the per- 
secuting views of the church, because their hopes rested upon 
the wideness of the breach between the contending parties. 

Even the Act of Uniformity did not satisfy the avidity of the 
clergy for means of extinguishing rivals. Two years afterwards 
" it was enacted, that wherever five persons above those of the 
same household should assemble in a religious congregation, 
every one of them was liable, for the first offence, to be impri- 
soned three months, or pay five pounds ; for the second, to be 
imprisoned six months, or ten pounds; and for the third, to be 
transported seven years, or pay a hundred pounds. "f 

The most remarkable transactions of the reigns of the last two 
of the Stuarts were the persecutions, hardly surpassed for savage 
barbarity by any with which the page of history is stained, car- 
ried on for the establishment of episcopacy in Scotland. We 
have so recently had occasion to dwell upon these transactions, 
in our review both of Brodie's History, and of Southey's Book of 
the Church, that the evidence thence afforded of the persecuting 
spirit of the church of England, must be fresh in the recollection 
of our readers. 

It is only further necessary, therefore, that we should shew 
by sufficient samples the spirit manifested by the priestly cor- 
poration in England since the epoch of the Revolution. 

At the time of the Revolution, a new order of things com- 
menced. Not only was the government placed on a new foun- 
dation, but the sentiments of the nation assumed a new charac- 
ter. From that day, the people regarded themselves as the arbi- 
ters of their destiny. From that day, they considered the institu- 
tions of the country, civil and ecclesiastical, as made for them, 
and not them for the institutions. From that day, the right of 
thinking, and of delivering their thoughts, both respecting go- 
vernment, and respecting religion, they assumed as their own ; 
and spurned the advocates of slavery, who would rob them of 
that invaluable possession. 



Hume's History of England, chap. Ixiv. 



t Ibid. chap. Ixiv. 



19 



" This spirit was nourished by the new government; which, 
being assailed, by the adherents of the old, with all the arguments 
which the obligation of being obedient to established power, 
solely because established, could by zeal and ingenuity be 
worked into, was under the necessity of defending itself by ar- 
guments drawn from the propriety of revolting against established 
power, whensoever an evil or the producer of evil, and from the 
concomitant and inseparable propriety of the people's deciding 
for themselves on the goodness or badness of every institution. 
This was the only solid ground on which the new government 
could be defended against the advocates of the old. And fortu- 
nate was the necessity which put such doctrines in circulation 
with all the influence of government to secure their diffusion 
and acceptance. Hence the sober and manly writings of Locke 
on the subject of government, laying the will and approbation of 
the people as its only legitimate foundation. And with the 
writings of Locke, those of many other eminent authors in a 
similar strain. 

In such a state of the public mind, and such a state of the 
government, the disposition of the clergy to strive for the mono- 
poly of the religious influence was obliged to manifest itself with 
great caution. In such circumstances the faintest indications are 
as, valid proofs of the disposition, as the strongest displays when 
the power was all in their hands. 

Our time will not admit of our ransacking the subsequent 
history to select the best illustrations. We must set down such 
particulars as a general recollection can supply. 

The first great incident, as respects this subject, is the Act of 
Toleration. It is well known how imperfect, as an instru- 
ment for securing religious liberty, the Act of Toleration was : 
and how much it was necessary to pare the bill down for the 
purpose of gaining so many of the more moderate churchmen 
as to afford it a chance of passing. Yet Burnett informs us 
that on account of the share he had in forwarding this muti- 
lated, this imperfect, this cramped, and mis-named liberty of 
conscience, he lost the conndence, and incurred the hatred of the 
church. 

The last volumes of Burnett's history, from the accession of 
William and Mary downwards, afford most remarkable evidence 
of the persecuting propensities of the English church. We 
recommend these volumes to the attentive perusal of our 
readers, as abounding with the most important information 
which is to be found in any part of our history. ' The different 
fortunes of the histories- of their own times by Clarendon and 
Burnett, are a curious proof of the power which the clergy 
have hitherto possessed of misleading the public mind, and 
spreading false opinions favourable to themselves. The narra- 
tive of Burnett lets out many facts which tell against the 



20 



clergy. That of Clarendon discloses none which it can conceal, 
and none without as thick a varnish, to hide their real complexion, 
as it is in his power to lay on. Burnett's is the superior produc- 
tion in every respect; in fidelity, in knowledge, in judgment, 
nay even in style. Yet admiration of Clarendon, with con- 
tempt of Burnett, was a fashion which the clergy contrived 
to set, and which up to this hour they have successfully main- 
tained. 

There are few men to whom this country is more indebted 
than to Bishop Burnett. To him, perhaps, more than to any 
other man, it is owing, that the church party did not overwhelm 
the government of William and Mary (they were very near 
accomplishing it); when either a return to the preceding slavery 
of the nation, or a civil war, would have been the inevitable con- 
sequence. Fortunately the crown had the nomination of bishops : 
fortunately a sufficient number of vacancies took place, to give 
the crown a majority in the upper house of Convocation ; and 
fortunately Bishop Burnett was the most active, the most able, 
and the most eloquent man both in that house, and in the House 
of. Peers : where, greatly by his means, the influence of the 
Court still maintained an ascendancy, while that of the clergy 
carried every thing before it, in the lower house both of Convoca- 
tion and Parliament. 

We shall now exhibit some specimens of the evidence which the 
volumes of Burnett afford. 

So early as the year 1689, the very year in which the Act of 
Toleration passed, he says, " The clergy began now to shew an 
implacable hatred to the nonconformists, and seemed to wish 
for an occasion to renewold severities against them. But wise 
and good men did very much applaud the quieting the nation 
by the toleration. It seemed to be suitable, both to the spirit 
of the Christian religion, and to the interest of the nation. It 
was thought very unreasonable, that while we were complaining 
of the cruelty of the church of Rome, we should fall into such 
practices among ourselves ; chiefly, while we were engaging in a 
war, in the progress of which we would need the united strength 
of the whole nation. 

" This bill gave the king great content. He in his own opinion 
always thought, that conscience was God's province, and that it 
ought not to be imposed upon : and his experience in Holland 
made him look on toleration as one of the wisest measures of go- 
vernment. He was much troubled to see so much ill humour 
spreading among the clergy, and by their means over a great 
part of the nation. He was so true to his principle herein, that 
he restrained the beat of some, who were proposing severe acts 
against priests." — Vol. iv. p. 21. 

Take another, a similar specimen in 1698 : — l< All this while it 
was manifest, that there were two different parties among the 



clergy ; one was firm and faithful to the present government, and 
served it with zeal; these did not envy the dissenters the ease 
that the toleration gave them ; they wished for a favourable op- 
portunity of making such alterations, in soma few rites and cere- 
monies, as might bring into the church those who were not at 
too great a distance from it; and I do freely own that I was of 
this number. Others took the oaths, indeed, and concurred in 
every act of compliance with the government, but they were not 
only cold in serving it, but were always blaming the administra- 
tion, and aggravating misfortunes: they expressed a great esteem 
for Jacobites, and in all elections gave their votes to those who 
leaned that way ; at the same time, they shewed great resent- 
ments against the dissenters, and were enemies to the toleration 
and seemed resolved never to consent to any alteration in their 
favour. The hulk of the clergy ran this urny, so that the moderate 
party was far out numbered. Profane minds had too great ad- 
vantages from this, in reflecting severely on a body of men, that 
took oaths, and performed public devotions, when the rest of 
their lives was too public and too visible a contradiction to such 
oaths and prayers." — Vol. iv. p. 411. 

Also in 1700 : — " The toleration of all the sects among us, had 
made us live more quietly together of late, than could be expected 
when severe laws were rigorously executed against Dissenters. 
No tumults or disorders had been heard of in any part of the 
kingdom these eleven years, since that act passed : and- yet the 
much greater part of the clergy studied to blow up this fire again, 
which seemed to be now, as it were, covered over with ashes." — 
Vol. iv. p. 474. 

" The clergy continued to be much divided; all moderate di- 
vines were looked upon by some hot men with an ill eye, as per- 
sons who were cold and indifferent in the matters of the church : 
that which flowed fiom a gentleness, both of temper and prin- 
ciple, was represented as an inclination to favour dissenters, 
which passed among many, for a more heinous thing than leaning 
to popery itself. Those men, who began now to be called the 
high-church party, had all along expressed a coldness, if not an 
opposition to the present settlement. Soon after the Revolution, 
some great preferments had been given among them, to try if it 
was possible to bring them to be hearty for thegovernment : but it 
appearing, that they were soured with a leaven, that had gone 
too deep to be wrought out, a stop was put to the courting them 
anymore. When they saw preferments went in another channel, 
they setup a complaint over England of the want of convocations, 
that they were not allowed to sit nor act with a free liberty, to 
consider of the grievances of the clergy, and of the danger the 
church was in, This was a new pretension, never thought of 
since the Reformation : some books were writ to justify it, with 
great acrimony of style, and a strain of insolence, that was pecu- 



22 



liar to one Atterbury, who had indeed very good parts, great 
learning, and was an excellent preacher, and had many extraor- 
dinary things in him; but was both ambitious and virulent out of 
measure ; and had a singular talent in asserting- paradoxes with 
a great air of assurance, shewing no shame when he was de- 
tected in them, though this was done in many instances; but 
he let all these pass, without either confessing his error?, or pre- 
tending to justify himself: he went on still venting new false- 
hoods in so barefaced a manner, that he seemed to have outdone 
the Jesuits themselves. He thought the government had so little 
strength or credit, that any claim against it would be well re- 
ceived. He attacked the supremacy of the Crown, with relation 
to ecclesiastical matters, which had been hitherto maintained by 
all our divines with great zeal. But now the hot men of the 
clergy did so readily entertain his notions, that in them it appeared 
those who are the most earnest in the defence of certain points, 
when these seem to be for them, can very nimbly change their 
minds upon a change of circumstances." — Vol. iv. p. 478. 

In 1701, he says, — The greater part of the clergy were in no 
good temper ; they hated the toleration, and were heavily charged 
with the taxes, which made them very uneasy ; and this disposed 
them to be soon inflamed by those, who were seeking out all 
possible methods to disorder our affairs. They hoped to have 
engaged them against the supremacy, and reckoned, that in the 
feeble state to which the government was now brought, they 
might hope either io wrest it quite from the Crown, and then it 
would fall into the management of the House of Commons; or if 
the king should proceed against them according to the statute, 
and sue them in a premunire, this might unite the clergy into 
such an opposition to the government, as would probably throw 
us into great convulsions. But many aspiring men among them, 
had no other design but to force themselves into preferment, by 
the opposition they made." — Vol. v. p. 545. 

In this year began the memorable contests about the bill against 
occasional conformity. Accordingly in this bill, which was 
brought into parliament by the church party, and in favour of 
which the clergy exerted themselves to raise the greatest fermeut 
in the nation, it was to be enacted that, " all those who took the 
sacrament and test (which by the Act passed in the year 1673, was 
made necessary to those who held offices of trust, or were ma- 
gistrates in corporations, but was only to be taken once by them) 
and did, after that, goto the meetings of dissenters, or any meet- 
ing for religious worship, that was not according to the Liturgy or 
practice of the Church of England, where five persons were pre- 
sent, more than the family, were disabled from holding their em- 
ployments, and were to be fined in an hundred pounds, and in five 
pounds a day for every day, in which they continued to act in 
iheir employments, after their having been at any such meeting. 



23 



They were also made incapable to hold any other employment, 
till after one whole year's conformity to the church, which was 
to be proved at the Quarter session. Upon a relapse, the pe- 
nalty and the time of incapacity were doubted ; no limitation of 
time was put in the bill, nor of the way in which the offence 
was to be proved. But whereas, the Act of Test only included 
the magistrates in corporations, all the inferior officers or freemen 
in corporations, who were found to have some interest in the 
elections, were now comprehended within this bill." — Vol. v. 
p. 652. 

The question was re-agitated in 1703. Bishop Burnett says, 
" I was desired to print what I said upon that occasion, which 
drew many virulent pamphlets upon me, but I answered none 
of them. I saw the Jacobites designed to raise such a flame 
among us, as might make it scarcely possible to carry on the 
war ; those who went not so deep, yet designed to make a 
breach on the toleration by gaining this point : and I was re- 
solved never to be silent, when that should be brought into de- 
bate ; for I have long looked on liberty of conscience as one of 
the rights of human nature, antecedent to society, which no man 
could give up, because it was not in his own power: and our 
Saviour's rule, of doing as we would be done by, seemed to be a 
very express decision to all men, who would lay the matter 
home to their own conscience, and judge as they would willingly 
be judged by others. 

" The clergy over England, who were generally inflamed with 
this matter, could hardly forgive the queen and the prince the 
coldness that they expressed on this occasion : the lord Godol- 
phin did so positively declare, that he thought the bill unseasona- 
ble, and that he had done all he could to hinder its being brought 
in, that though he voted to give the bill a secoud reading, that 
did not reconcile the party to him. They set up the Earl of 
Rochester as the only man to be depended on, who deserved to 
be the chief minister." — Vol. v. p. 719. 

The following is a remarkable passage: — " With this the ses- 
sion of parliament was brought to a quiet conclusion, after much 
heat and a great deal of contention between the two Houses. The 
queen, as she thanked them for the supplies, so she again recom- 
mended union and moderation to them. These words, which had 
hitherto carried so good a sound, that all sides pretended to 
them, were now become so odious to violent men, that even in 
sermons, chiefly at Oxford. the;? were arraigned as importing 
somewhat that was unkind to the church, and that favoured the 
dissenters. The Rouse of Commons had, during this session, 
lost much of their reputation, not only with fair and impartial 
judges, but even with those who weie most inclined to favour 
them, it is true, the body of the freeholders began to be un- 
easy under the taxes, and to cry out for a peace ; and most of the 



24 



capital gentry of England* who had the most to lose, seemed ia 
be ill-turned, and not to apprehend the dangers we were in, if 
we should fall under the power of France, and into the hands of 
the pretended Prince of Wales ; or else they were so fatally 
blinded, as not to see that these must be the consequences of 
those measures, into which they were engaged. 

" The universities, Oxford especially, have been very unhap- 
pily successful in corrupting the principles of those who were serit 
to be bred among them ; so that few of them escaped the taint 
of it, and the generality of the clergy were not only ill-principled 
but ill-tempered. They exclaimed against ail moderation as en- 
dangering the church, though it is visible lhat the church is in 
no sort of danger, from either the numbers or the interest that 
the dissenters have among us, who by reason of the toleration 
are now so quieted, that nothing can keep up any heat in those 
matters, but the folly and bad humour that the clergy are possess- 
ed with, and which they infuse into all those with whom they have 
credit. But at the same time, though the great and visible dan- 
ger that hangs over us is from popery, which a miscarriage in the 
present war must let in upon us, with an inundation not to be 
either resisted or recovered, they seem to be blind on that side, 
and to apprehend and fear nothing from that quarter/' — Vol. v. 
p. 752-54. 

The following is a slight instance, but yielding evidence which 
is not so. 

In 1709 an act passed, " which" says the bishop " was much 
desired, and had been often attempted, but had been laid aside 
in so many former parliaments, that there was scarce any hopes 
left to encourage a new attempt. It was for naturalizing all fo- 
reign Protestants, upon their taking the oaths to the government, 
and their receiving the sacrament in any Protestant church. 
Those who were against the act, soon perceived that they could 
have no strength, if they should set themselves directly to op- 
pose it : so they studied to limit strangers in the receiving the 

sacrament to the way of the church of England It was 

thought best to cast the door as wide open as possible for en- 
couraging strangers But all those who appeared for 

this large and comprehensive way, werereproached for their cold- 
ness and indifference in the concerns of the churfch; and in that 
I had a large share ; as I spoke copiously for it when it was brought 
up to the Lords." 

Something not less instructive than this passage is the com- 
ment of Swift npon the last sentence. It consists of the word 
" Dog." We shall add the words which immediately follow in 
the same paragraph. " The bishop of Chester spoke as zealously 
against it, for he seemed resolved to distinguish himself as a 
zealot for that which was called high church." 

Burnett speaking of the clerical proceedings in the same. year, 



25 

( i 709), and the hopes begun to be founded upon the sentiments 
of the queen, says, " Indeed it was but too visible, that the much 
greater part of the clergy were in a very ill temper, and undet 
very bad influences ; enemies to the toleration, and soured against 
the dissenters.'* 

It is well known in what manner the feeble and disjointed 
ministry > maintained by Queen Anne at the close of her reign, 
were dependent upon the church, and tools in its hands. It is 
also well known what measures were in progress, and would have 
been successful, but for the premature death of the queen and 
the insane squabbles among her ministers, for the restoration of 
the Pretender, and the barter of the liberties of England, for pri- 
vileges, alias persecuting powers, to the church. 

One of the last acts of her reign was passing the bill to pre- 
vent the growth of schism, i. e. to persecute infringers of the 
monopoly. And the very day of her death was the day on which 
the act was to come into operation. Tn consequence of her 
death, it never came into operation, and for this and for many 
other reasons, the death of that weak, misguided woman, whom 
the Duchess of Marlborough characterized as " a praying, godly 
idiot," was one of the events at which Englishmen have the 
greatest reason to rejoice. 

If the progress of the public mind towards that strength, which 
Was necessary to enable it succeessfully to assert for itself the 
right of thinking freely and freely uttering its thoughts on mat- 
ters of religion, was promoted by the revolutionary government 
of William and Mary, it was still further advanced by the acces- 
sion of the House of Hanover, whose stability on the throne of 
England could solely rest on the prevalence of those opinions by 
which the pretensions of the Stuarts and of the church were ex- 
ploded. 

Sir Robert Walpole, who had been defamed and persecuted 
by the church party, wielded the powers of government so long, 
and so long repressed the efforts of the church, that a mode of 
thinking utterly inconsistent with the claims of a monopoly of 
the religious influence, became habitual in the nation: and 
churchmen themselves could perceive that they had more to lose 
than to gain by contending against it. The same spirit has been 
constantly, of late rapidly, gaining strength ; and the disposition 
of the church has been obliged to manifest itself chiefly in one 
way ; in grasping vehemently the portion of monopolizing, or 
persecuting power which she had left, and resisting with the most 
vehement outcries, with scratching and kicking, every attempt to 
wrest an atom of it out her hands. It is, however, not woith 
while to illustrate at much length proceedings, of little impor- 
tance, except as evidence of the spirit from which they proceed ; 
and it is the less needful as a few instances will revive Ihe recol- 



26 

lection of others in the minds of all who are but moderately ac- 
quainted with our recent history. 

One case, which includes the most of what we think it neces- 
sary to allude to, is the case of the Test and Corporation acts. 
The history of the«e laws is pregnant with evidence. It proves 
the fact not only of eager retention of monopolizing, in this 
case, persecuting power, but of the lowness and meanness of the 
spirit, which it is clung to, and held with a convulsive grasp, by 
the church of England. 

The object of the Test and Corporation acts, speaking gene- 
rally, is to prevent every body, except a member of the church 
of England, from holding office in the government or any corpo- 
ration, by rendering communion with the church of England a 
necessary qualification. That is to say ; when it became impos- 
sible, from the improving spirit of the age, to preserve in being 
the law which went to drive out of their country all persons not 
of the church, those laws were eagerly retained which go to 
exclude them from all places of influence, and to secure, by the 
allurements of power, all they can secure of a monopoly to the 
church. Against even these laws the spirit of the age has risen 
so triumphant, that the government neither dares nor wills to put 
them in execution ; and an annual act of indemnity passes, as a 
n.itter of course, to exempt all men from the effects of breaking 
them. They exist, therefore, to no purpose, but that of making 
an odious and mischievous distinction, and affording the means 
of many petty vexations, which gratify the spirit of persecution, 
though it attains none of its objects. Yet, and the fact is un- 
speakably instructive, no attempt has ever been made, and it has 
often and perseveringly been made, to purge our legislation of this 
feculent matter, but it has been met on the part of the church 
with all the opposition which their remaining influence on the 
minds of the community, exerted in every possible way, and in 
shapes the most odious, enabled them to raise. 

We need not dwell on the evidence afforded by the no-popery 
cry, and the majorities in parliament, especially the upper House, 
against Catholic Emancipation. We need not quote the ser- 
mons, and more especially the charges, from the pens of the 
highest dignitaries in the church, enforcing the sinfulness of 
schism, that is, the sinfulness of following one's own convictions 
in matters of religion whenever they are not accordant with those 
which churchmpn profess. 

But the mention of the word schism brings to our recollection 
a passage of the celebrated work of Blackstone, which deserves 
attention. The evidence of the disposition of the church of 
England afforded by Blackstone, is of the greatest importance. 
Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England, were origi- 
nally delivered as a course of lectures at the head-quarters of 



27 

church orthodoxy, the University of Oxford. Blackstone looked 
to his popularity in the university, and his interest with the 
church, for the promotion which was the grand object of his life. 
The sentiments of the clergy were therefore carefully transplanted 
into his pages. 

The reader will V\ke notice, that in the following passages we 
quote from the first edition of Blackstone. Finding that the 
spirit of the age would not bear what the spirit of the clergy had 
suggested, Blackstone materially altered his phraseology in the 
succeeding impressions of his work. 

Speaking of the statute, 1st Elizabeth, c. 1, he says [vol. iv. 
49], " Thus was heresy reduced to a greater certainty than before ; 
though it mio-ht not have been the worse to have defined it in 
terms still more precise and particular." Might not have been 
the worse, is the phrase by which, when a choice is given between 
two things, we denote that the one, if better at all, is but little 
better than the other. " It might not have been the worse/' 
says Blackstone, " to have defined heresy in terms still more 
precise and particular, as a man still continued liable to be burnt, 
for what, perhaps, he did not understand to be heresy, til! the 
ecclesiastical judge so interpreted the words of the canonical 
scripture." It might not have been the worse, to have prevented, 
men from being so burned. This was cool, in the year 1769. 
Qucere : How far would those, who would just stop short of 
burning men for what they could not know to be heresy, go, for 
the punishment of those who could incur heresy, after being fully 
instructed what it was ? 

The writ de heretico comburendo was abolished by the statute 
29 Car. ii. c. 9. Upon this the Oxford commentator takes occa- 
sion to make a memorable declaration. " In this reign, our minds 
were delivered from the tyranny of superstitious bigotry, by de- 
molishing this last badge of persecution in the English law." 
[ib.] All the powers which remained, and not only remained, 
but were often inhumanly exercised, of tormenting those who 
did not worship and profess to believe after the model of the 
church of England, are, in the opinion of this mouth-piece of the 
clergy, not to be called persecution. We see therefore what he 
means. Any powers of tormenting which the church of Eng- 
land possesses not, or despairs of getting, may be called per- 
secuting powers. Whatever powers she possesses, and whatever 
use she makes of them, are always to be spoken of as good. He 
goes on ; 

" Every thing is now as it should be, unless" — what? — " un- 
less, 'perhaps, that heresy ought to be more strictly defined, and 
no prosecution permitted, till the tenets in question are by proper 
authority previously declared to be heretical. Under these re- 
strictions" (viz. of defining the offence), " it seems necessary for 
the support of the national religion, that the officers of the 



28 



church should have power to censure heretics, but not to efcte'f- 
ruinate or destroy them." Observe, that the word censure here 
is fraudulent. It means, punishment through that prosecution 
spoken of in the preceding clause ; punishment confined and li- 
mited only by the words which follow, not to exterminate or 
destroy. What is here claimed, therefore, as necessary for the 
support of the national religion is, the power of punishing for 
diversity of opinion or worship, to any extent short of extermi- 
nation and destruction. That this is insinuated, not plainly de- 
clared, does not diminish the weight of the evidence. The art 
of the rhetorician mainly consists of doing that by insinuation, 
which cannot be done so well by direct speaking. 

" Another species of offences against religion, are those which 
affect the established church ; and these are either positive Or 
negative. Positive, as by reviling its ordinances ; or negative, 
by non-conformity to its worship." — lb. 

Observe, that non conformity, bare non-conformity to the 
church of England's modes of worship, is treated of under the 
style and character of an offence, an act penally culpable. This 
is enough, admit this, and every thing follows. 

Next, observe, that the word revile is here deceptious and frau- 
dulent. It is a word which insinuates, what the author wished 
to be believed, but thought there might be inconvenience in af- 
firming it. Reviling is a thing to be condemned ; it is a word 
which means not merely censure, but bad, wicked censure. It is 
a censure either wholly undeserved, or far beyond the demerits, 
and for an improper purpose. But is it only censure thus unde- 
served, and with this ill-intention, which the author means here 
to denote? Quite the contrary. It is the endeavour in any 
mode to show that the creed, the forms, the powers of the church 
of England are either wrong in point of reason, or mischievous 
in point of practice. All this he knavishly denominates reviling; 
and thus prepares for punishment by putting on it the livery of 
crime ! 

He j^oes on as follows : — 

" And, first, of the offence of reviling the ordinances of the 
church. This is a crime" (mark the word, 1 a crime'), " of a 
much grosser nature than the other or mere non-conformity, 
since it carries with it the utmost indecency, arrogance, and in- 
gratitude. Indecency, by setting up private judgment in opposi- 
tion to public ; arrogance, by treating with contempt and rudeness, 
what has at least a better chance to be right than the singular 
notions of any particular man ; and ingratitude, by denying that 
indulgence and liberty of conscience to the members of the 
national church, which the retainers to eveiy petty conventicle 
enjoy."— Ib. 50. 

Here is reviling in abundance, and of the genuine kind, not 
one of its abominable ingredients omitted, and all in the highest 



29 

state of concentration. This is one of the most shameful pas- 
sages in any book of authority in the English language, and 
speaks a severe condemnation of the people by whom it could be 
endured. 

What is it, what is the malignant thing, upon which all this 
abuse is lavished ; which is a crime, a crime of peculiar grossness, 
which carries with it (an affected phrase, meaning that it in- 
cludes) the utmost indecency, arrogance, and ingratitude ? The 
sacred right of private judgment ! This it is, which is thus to be 
blackened, in order that it maybe punished, as often as its exer- 
cise, at least in freedom of speech, carries with it diversity from 
the church of England, diversity, at any rate, upon all the points 
which said church is pleased to call important. 

The exercise of private judgment is a crime of peculiar gross- 
ness; first, because it is " indecent." And it is indecent, be- 
cause " it sets up private judgment in opposition to public." 
Why, this is simply to have private judgment. The very exist- 
ence of private judgment is thus to be a crime. For a man to 
exercise private judgment for no purpose but to agree, right or 
wrong, with some other party, is to exercise no judgment at all. 
The total want of judgment not only suffices, but answers best for 
that end. Is not this a pretension, on the part of a priestly cor- 
poration, o^ some extent? Is any thing needed, in addition to 
this, to render their dominion absolute over the minds and bodies 
of men ? 

Observe that the phrase, here too made use of, is deceptious 
and fraudulent. To set any thing up against the public, means, 
commonly, the act of endeavouring the subversion of some public 
institution by criminal force. The simple and peaceable declara- 
tion of a mere diversity of opinion from the church of England 
on certain points, is here declared, by foul insinuation, to be a 
crime of this description. 

The next part of the abuse heaped on the exercise of private 
judgment is, that it is arrogant. To make out the arrogance, a 
curious process is instituted. First, expressing the result of 
one's own acts of judgment, this, and this simply, is called con- 
tempt and rudeness. But we deny the contempt and rudeness ; 
and next we affirm, that contempt and rudeness, even when com- 
mitted, are offences against good manners, to be punished by 
manners, not by the penalties of law. The second part of the 
process, to fasten the charge of arrogance upon the right of pri- 
vate judgment is, that the contempt and rudeness are exercised 
upon " what has at least a better chance to be right, than the 
singular notions of any particular man." What ? has it really 
been found that men could assert such a proposition as this, and 
dare to look society in the face? The singular (meaning indivi- 
dual, for here again we have a term which is deceptious and frau- 
dulent) notions of some particular men, wherever men are al- 



so 



lowed the free exercise of their understandings, are sure to he 
right, as far as the limits of the human faculties permit. But the 
tenets put forth by a corporation of priests, if not subject to op- 
position, are sure to be wrong, and wrong to the highest pitch of 
mischief, as being wholly directed to their own ends against the 
interests of mankind. 

We now pass to the last portion of this attack on 'the , right of 
private judgment. To exercise this right is to incur the crime of" 
ingratitude. To make out this charge, a memorable assertion is 
hazarded. The act of uttering opinions opposed by the church 
of England, or endeavouring to show the error of opinions which 
she maintains, is, with the height of impudence, declared to be 
" denying that indulgence and liberty of conscience, to the mem- 
bers of the national church, which the retainers to every petty 
conventicle enjoy." What? do the retainers to every petty con- 
venticle enjoy the privilege of speaking against " the retainers 
to conventicles," both " petty" and large, in pretty considerable 
latitude? Again, who denies •* that indulgence and liberty of 
conscience to the members of the national church, which the re- 
tainers to every petty conventicle enjoy V* This author begins 
with mendacious insinuation, and, gaining courage as lie proceeds, 
ends with direct and glaring falsehood. 

We thought it of importance to exhibit a specimen of the - 
exposure of this law scribe of the church in one passage: there 
are many others of like import, to which the reader may easily 
apply the same mode of examination for himself. 

The next subject, in respect to which we are solicitous to pre- 
sent a correct estimate of the purposes of a corporate clergy, is the 
Liberty o f the Press. 

The aversion of the -Romish church to the progress of mind 
needs no illustration. By every Protestant, the hostility of that 
corporation to the liberty of the press will Ue allowed to be 
constant and natural. We shall therefore confine ourselves to 
the evidence of the disposition manifested by the church of 
England. 

Before proceeding to the items of this account, it may be well 
for the reader to call briefly to his recollection, what we mean, 
when we use the term liberty of the press. Minor points being- 
left out of confederation, it is evident that liberty of the press 
is a vain sound, unless, in respect to the two subjects of primary 
importance, to wit, government and religion, every man has the 
power of publishing and maintaining any opinions which he 
pleases, and of making any remarks which he pleases on the 
opinions published by others, either as unsound in point of reason, 
or leading to mischievous consequences in practice. 

If the iaw is not thus equal, but one set of men are distin- 
guished by the privilege of publishing what they please, while 
other men are nob allowed to publish any thing but what the 



31 



men of privilege may approve, it is evident what opinions will be 
allowed to be heard by the people, and will always be uttered in 
their hearing with praise; of course opinions calculated to lodge 
power in the hands of those who thus possess the monopoly of 
opinions, and to lay the rest of the community, bound in mental 
chains, the most cruel and destructive of all chains, at the feet 
of unlimited, unchallenged, insatiable, masters and tyrants. 
Such are the interests involved in the liberty of the press, and 
such is the instrument of human weal, against which it is the 
nature of a corporate priesthood to wage interminable war! 

We shall not dwell upon the atrocities of the Convocation 
and the Star-chamber, when Laud placed in so dazzling a light 
the conviction of himself and brethren, that the extinction of a 
free press, even in the blood of its employers, was absolutely 
necessary for the accomplishment of their designs. This man is 
the idol of the church of England : has been the boasted pattern 
of a churchman from his own to the present day. Better evi- 
dence of the early and continued disposition of that church to- 
wards the liberty of the press can hardly be required, and the 
extreme importance of the subject is the only reason which could 
induce us to employ another word in its illustration. 

When the enemies of any great instrument of human good are 
unable wholly to prevent its existence, they may show an equal 
degree of bitter enmity, and show it no less decisively, by a 
constant endeavour to damage the instrument, and cramp its ope- 
ration, than in other circumstances by endeavouring and accom- 
plishing its ruins. 

In regard to the press, the church of England are chargeable 
with both enormities. As long as their utmost endeavours could 
accomplish the horrid purpose of preventing entirely the liberty 
of printing, they did prevent it : they kept the instrument in 
their own hands, and allowed it to be employed for none but 
their own purposes, or purposes allied to their own. They had 
influence to retain it under licence, and the licence in their own 
custody, till four years after the Revolution. 

The spirit of free inquiry, aided by the use which was made of 
the licensed press, became too strong at last to submit to this re- 
straint. But when the licence was taken off, the press was left 
in a condition far indeed from free. It was interdicted from all 
those exertions by which the extraordinary benefits it is calcu- 
lated to yield are most certainly realized. Severe punishment 
was provided against free discussion in matters of religion and 
government — the two sources of the greatest evil to mankind, 
when allowed to be made subservient to the purposes of the few 
against the many, and impossible not to be so made, whensoever 
the press is net active and free. 

We now state broadly, that all the hurtful and hateful powers, 
which were thus preserved, of restraining the freedom of the 



32 



press, and depriving mankind of the greatest of its benefits, the 
clergy have, until the present hour, shown the greatest disposi- 
tion to employ ; that they have employed them, as far as the 
spirit of the age would permit their being employed ; and that 
every attempt to diminish them, and to give to the press any ad- 
ditional portion of its beneficial freedom, has found in the clergy 
its most strenuous and furious opponents. 

We know not that on this subject we have occasion to do any 
thing more than refer our readers to what each of them may re- 
collect of the prosecutions, and punishments, for libel, since the 
censorship was abolished, and the proceedings in parliament and 
out of it, on the occasion of every motion, from that to the pre- 
sent time, which has had the press for its object. 

Jf any of them cast about for evidence of the disposition of 
the clergy towards freedom of discussion during the period in 
question, he cannot light on any thing more pregnant, than that; 
memorable passage of Blackstone, on which we have already 
commented, respecting what he calls reviling of the church. 
Though words spoken are there also included, words printed 
are of course the object chiefly aimed at, because the printed 
words have the greatest diffusion and the greatest power. The 
effort, there made, to second the purposes of the church, is an 
effort to limit, or rather to destroy the freedom of the press, as 
regards religion. And the remarkable circumstances of that ef- 
fort we need not again present to the minds of our readers, on 
which we trust they have made as deep an impression as they 
have on ours. To employ the press with freedom on matters of 
religion, is there stamped " a crime" — a " gross crime" — a 
crime, " which carries with it the utmost indecency, arrogance, 
and ingratitude ;" and which should be open to any punishment 
by the officers of the church, not extending to extirpation and 
destruction. 

Having this evideuce, need we be very solicitous about adding 
to it, by multiplying instances in detail ? 

William Whiston was one of the most learned men whom this 
country has ever produced, and a man the excellence of whose 
life and character will bear an advantageous comparison with 
that of any man of any country or of any age. The friend of the 
great Newton, and his successor in the mathematical chair at 
Cambridge, a sincere and zealous Christian, an indefatigable 
promoter of learning and knowledge, he contracted, unhappily 
for himself, a strong opinion of the unchristian spirit and t en- 
dency of the Athanasian creed; and being a man in whose mind 
the interests of truth far predominated over all personal consi- 
derations, he fearlessly promulgated and maintained his heresy. 
We cannot enter into the particulars of the persevering and 
merciless persecution which he underwent. Suffice it to say, 
that he was ruined, and compelled for the remainder of his 



33 



days to subsist mainly upon charity. Nor was high church sa- 
tisfied with striking him down, till it had the pleasure of also 
trampling upon him when down. The scurrility of the Rev. Dr. 
Swift, upon such a man, in such circumstances (" Wicked Will 
Whiston," &c.) relished, as the monuments of the times inform 
us it was, is an indication of a spirit which we leave our readers 
to characterize. 

Another remarkable case is that of Mr. Woolston, of whom 
the following is the account given by Whiston. " He was a 
Fellow of Sidney College, in Cambridge. He was in his younger 
days a clergyman of very good reputation, a scholar, and well 
esteemed as a preacher, charitable to the poor, and beloved by 
all good men that knew him. Now it happened that after some 
time he most unfortunately fell into Origen's allegorical works, 
and poring hard upon them without communicating his studies 
to any body, he became so fanciful in that matter, that he 
thought the allegorical way of interpretation of the scriptures of 
the Old Testament had been unjustly neglected by the moderns, 
and that it might be useful for an additional proof of Christianity. 
Insomuch that he preached this doctrine first in the college 
chapel, to the great surprise of his audience, though (his inten- 
tions being known to be good, and his person beloved) no dis- 
couragement was shewed him there. * * * * His notions ap- 
peared to be so wild, that a report went about that he was under 
a disorder of mind : which when he heard instead of that ap- 
plause he thought he had deserved by retrieving a long-forgotten 
argument for the truth of Christianity, he grew really disordered, 
and, as I have been informed, be was accordingly confined for a 
about a quarter of a year, after-which, though his notions were 
esteemed in part the effect -of some such disorder, yet did he re- 
gain his liberty. When he found himself pretty , well, as he 
thought, he fell a writing to great men, and to his old friends, 
and insisted on the truth of his notions, and pretended that the 
reports of his disorders arose only from the inability the learned 
were under to confute them. Nay, at length he wrote several 
pamphlets to prove that following the literal sense of the Old 
Testament was no better than antichristianism, though, in the 
mean time, he sometimes insinuated that Jesus Christ's own 
miracles were no other than allegorical miracles, and not real 
facts ; and exposed those miracles, taken in the literal sense, 
after such a manner, and with such a mixture of wit and scof- 
fing, as if he in earnest intended to abuse and oppose the Chris- 
tian religion, which design, however, he utterly denied, and 
seemed to wonder that any should impute such a thing to him ; 
and about the same time he wrote a pamphlet against some 
of the unbelievers which was by no means a contemptible one." 

He was first deprived of his fellowship, though it seems to 
have been all he had for his support; "and though," says 



34 



Whiston, " I did all I could to save it for him, by writing to the 
college on-his behalf ; but the clamour ran so high against him 
there that no intercession could prevail for him." See what the 
high running of said clamour produced next — no doubt, its legi- 
timate consummation ! " After this," continues the same honest 
reporter," the government fell upon him" — a good expression — 
" and had him indicted in Westminster-hall for blasphemy and 
profaneness, at which time I went to sir Philip York, the then 
attorney-general, but now lord-chancellor, and gave him an ac- 
count of poor Mr. Woolston, and how he came into his allegori- 
cal notions, and told him that their common lawyers would not 
know what such an allegorical cause could mean, offering to come 
myself into the court and explain it to them in case they pro- 
ceeded, but still rather desiring they would not proceed any fur- 
ther against him. He promised he would not proceed, unless 
the then secretary of state, the lord Townshend, sent him an or- 
der so to do." The following fact lets in the necessary light 
upon the real movers in the business. Whiston continues, " I 
then went to Dr. Clarke, to persuade him to go with me to the 
lord Townshend, but he refused, alleging that the report would 
then go abroad that the king supported blasphemy." 

Who would have sent abroad such a report? The appearance of 
another pamphlet by Woolston, exaggerating on the necessity of 
his allegorical view by exhibiting as strongly as in his power the 
absurdity, as it appeared to him, of regarding the miracles as 
matters of fact, so inflamed the spirit of persecution, that the 
proceedings against him could no longer be stayed. And the 
case of Woolston has formed the leading precedent for punish- 
ing, as a crime, freedom of writing on religion, from that to the 
present time. 

We can hardly anticipate that the clergy will seek, on this oc- 
casion, to save themselves by the poor pretext, that what was 
done by the government was not done by them. One of the 
boasted uses. of such a church as ours, " who lifts her mitred 
front in courts and palaces," is, that she has power to obtain acts 
of this kind from the government ; acts which she denominates 
services to religion, and which are services of that kind which 
was rendered to Jesus by his servant Peter, when he drew his 
sword, and cut off the ear of the servant of the high priest, if 
it be good to prosecute, the clergy would be inexcusable if they 
were not themselves the prime agents of prosecution. If it is 
bad, why do they not prevent it? Would the government go 
the length of a single act to stifle the voice of freedom in religion, 
were it known to be contrary to the inclinations of the church ? 
We shall therefore proceed upon it as an undoubted fact, that 
all prosecutions on the score of religion are prosecutions by the 
church, and that the reverend the judges are on such occasions 
the mere mouth-pieces of the reverend the clergy. 



35 



Let us now take a slight cognition of the progeny, which the 
priest begets upon the judge ; that monster, half cant, half grim-, 
gribber, which the man on the bench brings forth, when he 
lends himself to crush the freedom of writing in matters of 
religion. 

The King v. Woolston is treated by the lawyers as a leading 
case.* It was moved in arrest of judgment, that the offence was 
not punishable in the temporal courts. But the judges declared 
they would not suffer this point to be argued — mark the reason — 
" for the Christian religion is established in this kingdom : and 
therefore they would not allow any books to be written which 
would tend to alter that establishment." If the worship of Mo- 
loch were established, this rule would hold equally good. Truth 
and utility are tossed out of doors, that good lodging may be 
preserved for the Church. Establishment, Establishment, is the 
word. What it is that is established, true or false, good or evil, 
is wholly out of the question. 

The court added, " that Christianity was part of the law; that 
whatever derided Christianity derided therefore the law, and was 
an offence against the law." This reason is just the same as 
the former ; it is merely a fresh form of words to say that Chris- 
tianity is established, and that the mere fact of establishment 
is a proper ground for punishing every human being that calls in 
question the truth or goodness of the established matter. 

We have here a case of that fraudulent use of language, of 
which we detected so many instances in a short passage of 
Blackstone, and with which the law language of England abounds 
beyond all example, and all belief, " The law," in its large and 
general acceptation means, the whole body of the securities pro- 
vided for our persons, our properties, and all that is dear to us. 
The man that by derision, or an^y thing else, tries to destroy or 
weaken the force of these securities, is the greatest of criminals. 
" The law," however, has another meaning. It may be any 
" part or parcel" of the whole body of enactments; and it may 
be a part and parcel which not only does not aid the general 
means of security, but tends with all its force to impair them. 
To seek to cut off this cause of infirmity or hurtfulness in the 
law, either by argument or ridicule, is so far from an offence 
against the law, in its more general acceptation, that the whole 
tendency of it is to strengthen and improve the law. The knavery 
of the lawyer, acting with its usual tool, a juggling, equivocating 
term, makes this admirable service, which is an attack upon 
"the law," in one sense of the term, namely a peccant part, 
parcel, or pendicle of the law, be construed and taken for what 
it is not— an attempt to deprive society of the benefits of law. 

Thus fraudulent and worthless is that pretext for punishing 



* Holt, Law of Libel, 67. 



36 



freedom of speech, which is wrapt up in the canting jargon, that 
Christianity is part and parcel of the law of England. Observe 
too the sweeping operation of the dictum. If nothing which is 
part and parcel of the law is to be free to the press, nothing is 
free. In respect to other things, freedom of the press is a word 
without a meaning ; if the press is not free, in respect to go- 
vernment and religion, it is not free at all. Mark well that in 
the destruction of religious freedom, that of all other freedom is 
involved. - 

It was urged in the defence, that the opinion expressed by 
Woolston neither was, nor was intended to be, an attack upon 
Christianity. But the court said, that " the attacking of Christ- 
ianity in the way in which it was attacked in this book, was de- 
stroying the very foundation of it : and though there were profes- 
sions in the book, that the design of it was to establish Christ- 
ianity upon a true bottom, by considering these narratives in 
scripture as emblematical and prophetical, these professions were 
not to be credited, and the rule is, allegatio contra factum non 
est admittenda.** 

This deserves to be carefully marked. The question was, in 
which of two senses, the accounts of the miracles in the New 
Testament were to be received. According to Woolston the or- 
dinary acceptation was wrong and injurious to Christianity. The 
court affirmed, that his was wrong, and subversive of Christianity. 
By what title? This was a matter of opinion, which the court 
took upon itself to decide by the mere word of a despot. Where 
had the court learned to be infallible in theology? Nor was this 
all. The court took upon itself to determine and declare, that 
the author was a liar; his professions not to be believed. Upon 
what evidence ? We intreat you, reader, to mark the evidence. 
It is a curious specimen of the process by which judges can fix 
guilt upon any man whom it is their interest to destroy. Allega- 
tio contra factum non est admittenda : " Professions are not to 
be admitted against the fact." What fact ? Here was only one 
fact, namely, that of writing a certain opinion about the miracles. 
Woolston made no professions against that fact; he fully admitted 
it. He professed that he did no injury to Christianity. The 
court affirmed that he did; but this was matter of opinion, not 
fact. Here, therefore, was no allegatio contra factum, and the 
ground for the affirmation of the falsehood of Woolston being 
worthless, the affirmation of it by the judges was criminal in the 
highest degree. 

Lord Raymond, Chief Justice, in delivering the opinion ot 
the court said, " I would have it taken notice of, that we do not 
meddle with any differences in opinion; and that we^ interfere 
only where the very root of Christianity is struck at." This is 
accurate language; is it not? well calculated to let men pre- 
cisely know, what they are, and are not, to be punished for. 



37 



" We do not meddle with differences in opinion." Wholly un- 
true. In the case of religious libels, they meddle with nothing 
else. The " root" of Christianity : what part of Christianity is 
that? And how is a man to know when he is " striking" at the 
" root," rather than the trunk, or some of the branches ! 

The proceeding here requires some developement. The court, 
after laying down, and acting upon narrow maxims, which not 
merely restrict liberty but destroy it, comes out with a declara- 
tion, vague, indeed, and uncertain in its meaning, but on the 
face of it importing a large liberty. This, you will say, is con- 
tradictory, and highly absurd. That is true; nothing can be 
more so. Yet it is not here only, but in many other parts of the 
law, that the judges have provided themselves with maxims simi- 
larly contradictory. We have on a former occasion observed, in 
politics, the great use, to fraudulent purposes, of the see-saw. 
In judicature, there is still a greater use, for the purposes of 
judges, in contradictory maxims. In whatever part of the field 
of law the judges can lay down contradictory maxims, they are 
despotic, and may do what they please. - Let us put a broad 
case for illustsation. Suppose they had two maxims- 1. "It is 
good to punish a thief." — 2. " All men who commit theft, for 
their own benefit, and not purely for the sake of hurt to their 
neighbour, may go uupunished." With these maxims, if they 
had them, it is evident, the judges might in every case punish, 
or not punish, just as they pleased. So in the case of the liberty 
of the press ; it is good to have a set of maxims by which every 
thing may be punished, and also a set of maxims by which every 
thing may be exempted from punishment: because, then, judges 
may do what they please, or their employers please. Thus, it is 
exceedingly important to have a maxim, " Let the liberty of the 
press be sacred." By this every thing may be exempted from 
punishment. It is equally important to another maxim, " Let 
the licentiousness of the press be prevented." By this every 
thing may be -punished. It is important to have one maxim, 
" We meddle not with differences of opinion." By this, every 
thing be exempt. It is also importaut to have another maxim, 
" Christianity fs part and parcel of the law of the land." By 
this, every atom of difference from the opinion of the church of 
England may be punished : thus the Athanasian creed is part 
and parcel of the law of the land ; the thirty-nine articles are 
part and parcel of the law of the land, articles where all the 
nice and disputable points are carefully collected, and the opi- 
nions, which shall be true by ordinance of law, presented for the 
legal faith and conscience of all the subjects of the realm. 

From the time of this prosecution, till the French revolution, 
which produced a state "of mind highly favourable to the -bent 
of the clergy, there was but little scope for employing the 
powers of law to crush freedom of printing on the subject of reli- 



38 - 

gion. The spirit of the age would not bear prosecution of the 
dissenters, for such heresies as they indulge in ; and with respect 
to infidelity, or opinions unfavourable to Christianity in general, 
the situation of the clergy was somewhat perplexing, it was 
chiefly men of rank, or writers of very high reputation, who ques- 
tioned in their works the pretensions of Christianity ; lord Shaftes- 
bury, for instance, lord Bolingbroke, lord Chesterfield, lord 
Kaims, Mr. Hume, Mr. Gibbon, Adam Smith ; and with a formid- 
able enemy the clergy are commonly well inclined to avoid a dis- 
pute. It is also true that, during the fifty years which preceded 
the French revolution, infidelity in the higher circles was a spe- 
cies of fashion. Among the beau monde in France it was univer- 
sal; and they at that time gave the tone to the leading classes 
in the rest of Europe. It is not a secret, how Christianity was 
regarded by the highest men, both in the state and the law, in 
England, during the time of which we are speaking.* To excite 
prosecution for writing freely on the subject of religion, was at- 
tended with some hazard in these circumstances. And the fact 
is observable, that men, feeling themselves pretty much at li- 
berty to declare their thoughts, made very little use of that liberty, 
the question appearing to be decided in the minds of those for 
whom almost exclusively at that time books were written ; for it 
is since the French revolution, mostly, that the body of the 
people have become readers, and that men of talenthave thought 
it an object worthy of their ambition to prepare works for their 
instruction. 

Though powers of law had thus dropped out of the hands of 
the clergy, their unabated rancour towards the liberty of the 
press does not the less certainly appear. Passages without end 
might be quoted from their sermons and other writings, in which 
they complain, in the bitterest terms, that such and such writings 
are permitted to appear, and that the writers of them are not pu- 
nished ; often denouncing the vengeance of God against the na- 
tion, for thus permitting his word to be denied. But we shall 
omit these illustrations, and proceed to what we reckon one of 
the most atrocious manifestations of the spirit of the clergy; we 
mean, their disposition to blacken the character of those who 
hold opinions different from theirs ; to defame their morals, to 
make them be regarded, as first vicious, next unbelievers, and 
unbelievers solely in consequence of their vices. Such has been 

* Warburton's testimony to this fact will probably be held sufficient evidence. 
" Indeed/' says he, in his dedication to the Freethinkers, " were it my design, in 
the manner of modern dedications, to look our for powerful protectors, I do not 
know where I could sooner find them, than amongst the gentlemen of your denomi- 
nation ! for nothing, I believe, strikes the serious observer with more surprise, in 
this age of novelties, than that strange propensity to infidelity, so visible in men 
of almost every condition ; amongst whom the advocates of Deism are received 
with all the applause due to the inventors of the arts of life, or the deliverers of 
oppressed and injured nations," 



39 



the course pursued not merely by the declaimers, those who 
could calumniate, though they could not reason; it has been 
adopted, we will say disgracefully adopted, which shews how 
deeply roots' of the poisonous tree have struck, by the very 
greatest and best men of whom the church has to boast; men of 
great powers and of great virtues, Berkeley for instance, Clarke, 
Tillotson, Barrow, and others. 

Berkeley is not ashamed to set up as representative of the class 
of unbelievers, a minute philosopher, as he nicknames him, who 
formally and deliberately preaches wickedness, and denies abso- 
lutely the obligations of morality. " Lysicles. Men of narrow 
capacities and short sight, being able lo see no further than one 
link in a chain of consequences, are shocked at small evils 
which attend upon vice. But those who can enlarge their view, 
and look through a long series of events, may behold happiness 
resulting from vice, and good springing out of evil in a thousand 
instances. To prove my point I shall not trouble you with au- 
thorities or far-fetched arguments, but bring you to plain matter 
of fact. Do but take a view of each particular vice, and trace it 
over its effects and consequences, and then you will clearly per- 
ceive the advantage it brings to the public." He then goes over 
the several vices of drunkenness, gaming, highway robbery, 
whoredom ; and at last declares to his companion, " Thus, in 
our dialect, a "vicious man is a man of pleasure; a sharper is one 
that plays the whole game ; a lady is said to have an affair, a 
gentleman to be a gallant, a rogue in business to be one that 
knows the world. By this means we have no such things as sots, 
debauchees, whores, rogues, or the like, in the beau monde, who 
may enjoy their vices without incurring disagreeable appellations. 
Euphranor. Vice then is, it seems, a fine thing with an ugly 
name. Lysicles. Be assured it is."* 

This is vulgar defamation, mere mendacious calumny. But 
it is also something infinitely worse. It was well known that 
there were men with minds prepared to believe the odious tale, 
men with whom it would stand in the place of all argument : 
men who would be sure to consider the opinions of wicked per- 
sons, as wicked opinions ; not requiring to be repelled by the 
arguments of the divine, but stifled by the hands of the gaoler, 
or hangmen. 

The fact is, that many of the writers unfavourable to Christi- 
anity have been men of eminent virtue, and distinguished by their 
ardent endeavours to strengthen the ties of morality among man- 
kind. We mention this as a matter of history merely, without 
founding upon it any inference with regard to the tendency of 
the religious opinions, either of them or their opponents. Hobbes 
in this country and Bayle on the continent, not to speak of 



-tfiimte Philosopher, Dial. ix. 



40 



others, will stand a comparison with the best and greatest men 
that have ever lived : and if infidel writers, as a class, be compared 
with other classes, of what class, not even excepting the clerical, 
can it be affirmed with truth, that its characrer for morality 
stands higher than theirs? Nothing, therefore, can exceed the 
baseness of the clergy in taking the advantage which the pre- 
possessions of the vulgar afford them, by assuming that it is a 
vicious life vyhich engenders reasonings and conclusions unfavour- 
able to religion. To bear down an adversary, not by refuting his 
bad arguments, but defaming his good life, is a course worthy 
not of the best, but the worst of causes; and all sincere Chris- 
tians ought to unite as one man, to clear themselves of so deep a 
stain. 

Berkeley does not stop short till he has told the world that 
the employment of infidels is, to recommend even the most 
atrocious crimes. " An unlucky accident now and then befals 
an ingenious man. The minute philosopher Magirus, being de- 
sirous to benefit the public, by calculating an estate possessed by 
a near relation who had not the heart to spend it, soon convinced 
himself upon these principles, that it would be a very worthy ac- 
tion to dispatch out of the way such a useless fellow, to whom 
he was next heir. But for this laudable attempt, he had the mis- 
fortune to be hanged by an under-bred judge and jury." 

He would have forgotten a most important weapon against 
the infidels if he had not imputed to them political as well as 
moral wickedness. Their representative is thus made to boast : 
" We have cleared the land of all prejudices towards govern- 
ment or constitution, and made them fly like other phantasms 
before the light of reason and good sense. Men who think 
deeply cannot see any reason why power should not change 
hands as well as property ; or why the fashion of a government 
should not be changed as easy as that of a garment. The per- 
petual circulating and revolving of wealth and power, no matter 
through what or whose hands, is that which keeps up life and 
spirit in a State. Those who are even slightly read in our philo- 
sophy, know that of all prejudices, the silliest is an attachment 
to forms. Crito. To say no more upon so clear a point, the 
overturning a government may be justified upon the same prin- 
ciples as the burning a town, would produce parallel effects, and 
equally contribute to the public good." And after a few sentences 
Lysicles affirms, " Laws and regulations to right and wrong, 
crimes and duties, serve to bind weak minds, and keep the vulgar 
in awe ; but no sooner doth a true genius arise, but he breaks his 
way to greatness through all the trammels of duty, conscience, 
religion, law ; to all which he sheweth himself infinitely superior." 

And this is given as a true representation of the speculative 
opinions, and practical principles, in morals and politics, of all 
who question the divine origin of Christianity ! 



41 



We had intended to have exhibited specimens of the same 
spirit of honest representation and fair dealing, on the part of 
other divines of the greatest eminence, but Berkeley's passages 
have tempted us so far, that we must now content ourselves 
with a reference to what we intended to insert from Archbishop 
Tillotson, and Drs. Barrow and Clarke. In Tillotson the reader 
may find what will suffice for evidence in the sermons Ixxxviii. 
and lxxxix., intituled, " Honesty the best Preservative against 
dangerous Mistakes in Religion;" in sermon ccxlv. intituled, 
H The Excellency and Universality of the Christian Religion ;" 
and sermon ccxlvi., intituled, The Ground of Bad Men's 
Enmity to the Truth." For the same purpose we refer him, in 
Barrow, to the sermon " On Infidelity," towards the end, and to 
the second sermon " On Faith." The only specimen which we 
think it necessary to adduce of the sprit in the writings of Dr. 
Clarke, is near the beginning of his work on " The Evidences of 
Natural and Revealed Religion/' where, immediately following 
the statement of the fifteen propositions, which he undertakes to 
establish, he gives an account of the several sorts of Deists. 

When men, not only of such powers of reasoning, but of so 
much true virtue and moderation, make assumptions thus ground- 
less and indignant, they afford evidence against the body, by the 
spirit of which they are carried so directly against the current oi 
their own nature, infinitely stronger than what is furnished by 
the railings of such a man as W T arburton, who proceeds upon it 
as a legitimate postulatum, that if there be any man who holds 
one opinion different from any opinion of Warburton, such man 
is a wretch, and has no one good quality, either moral or intellec- 
tual, about him. 

The following, which is a small touch of his hand, will ex- 
emplify his mode of dealing with the infidels. It is Cardan, the 
mention of whom produces the following decent effusion : — " The 
charming picture he (Cardan) draws of himself, and which he 
excuses no otherwise than by laying the fault on his stars, will 
hardly prejudice any one in favour of his opinions." Warburton, 
we see, knew the effect produced upon the credit of doctrines by 
the opinion which might be spread of the character of him who 
maintained them; and with this knowledge, he gives out the fol- 
lowing as the character of the infidel. " How far it (Cardan's 
picture of himself) resembles any other of the brotherhood, they 
best know who have examined the genius of modern infidelity. 
However, thus he speaks of his own amiable turn of mind : — * In 
diem viventem, nugacem, religionis contemptorem, injuriae illatse 
memorem, invidum, tristem, insidiatorem, proditorem, magum, 
incantatorem, suorum osorem, turpi libidini deditum, solitarium 
inamcenum, austerum, sponte etiam divinantem, zelotypum, ob- 
scoenura, lascivum, maledicum, varium, ancipitem, impurum, ca- 
lumniatorem/ &c. We have had many free-thinkers, but few 



42 



such free-speakers. But though these sort of writers are not 
used to give us so direct a picture of themselves, yet it hath been 
observed, that they have unawares copied from their own tempers, 
in the ungracious drawings they have made of human nature and 
religion."* 

Free-thinkers are a " class, who never cultivate a truth, but in 
order to graft a lie upon it."f 

And this is the style in which Warburton indulges himself, 
as often as his discourse brings an infidel before him, from the 
beginning to the end of his very vulgar volumes, vulgar in every 
thing, vulgar in language, vulgar in tone and temper, vulgar 
even in learning, for which he has got a most undue reputation, 
but most of all vulgar in reasoning^ of which he understands 
not even the elements ; for we doubt if an aggregate of bad rea- 
sonings, a match for his, exists in the writings of any other man, 
that ever put pen to paper. 

We have now exceeded the limits to which an article ought to 
run, and yet have only reached two of the evils to which the fatal 
measure of incorporating a body of clergy gives birth : persecution 
on account of religion, and hostility to the liberty of the press. 
The developement of its further effects in depraving both religion 
and morality, in corrupting education and government, in retard- 
ing the progress of the human mind, and in degrading the cha- 
racter, intellectual and moral, of the clergy, we shall undertake 
on some future occasion. 

* Divine Legation, b. i. § 3. t lb. b. iii. § 6. 



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